


Truth

by Phantom_Ice



Series: Phantom's Fire and Ice [3]
Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: A kiss and a hug are not enough, Gen, Maddie Fenton's A+ Parenting, Multiple Implied suicide attempts, No emotional magic that makes it all better, Please watch your children, Self-Hatred, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-02
Updated: 2017-08-01
Packaged: 2018-12-10 02:07:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11681787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Phantom_Ice/pseuds/Phantom_Ice
Summary: Original/alternate ending to 'Who I Really Am' (currently only posted on Fanfiction.net), takes place during chapter 5: Maddie Fenton will find out what's wrong with her baby boy, even if it means a small invasion of his personal space, but what happens when she is faced with a situation no mother ever wants to experience? Danny has a darker secret than she ever wanted to imagine.For first ending, only read up to the first chapter. If you want to be sad today, read the whole thing.





	1. Truth

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, guys, I've been writing on fanfiction.net for a while now, and am finally getting around to cross-posting all my stuff here. This particular story is hella old. I normally love constructive criticism... but for this one you're probably better off not even bothering. It's been years. I know the problems. But hey, if you still want to, go ahead. If you notice a consistent problem, point it out.

Maddie stealthily creeped through the door to her son's room, looking both ways before jumping into the air, doing a summersault, and landing in a crouch next to his desk. Danny had been acting even more distant and melancholy than usual lately, and this worried Maddie. Right now it was ten at night, and Danny was nowhere to be seen. She knew that if he followed normal schedule, chances were nobody would hear from him until at least ten thirty. Maddie Fenton was determined to use that time to finally find out why that was, even if it meant a small intrusion on his personal space.

She crept from next to the desk to one of it's drawers. If her son wouldn't tell her what was wrong, his stuff would. In the first drawer, papers, failed tests, and unfinished homework. Disappointing, but typical of Danny, at least it was now. The next two drawers were more interesting. The first was filled, rather messily, with first-aid supplies. Everything from small band aids and Neosporin, to gauze and first degree burn creams. Even a few injections that, had Maddie opened them, she would have seen to be filled with a certain gooey glowing green liquid.

Maddie questioned why all this was here, was Danny somehow getting hurt? The next drawer was filled with miscellaneous ghost hunting inventions of her and Jack's. How interesting. Did her little non confrontational baby boy have an interest in ghost hunting? Was that what was hurting him to the point that he needed all this medical supplies? Before Maddie could ponder any further, the handle on the door of Danny's room squealed and turned. Madde gasped, looking around for a place to hide. Why was Danny home so early? (Or late, but you know what she meant). In desperation Maddie threw herself into her sons closet, the door shutting just as the door to his room opened. There was a slight shuffling sound, and then the sound of a body collapsing onto the bed.

'Perfect, he sounds exhausted,' she thought to herself, 'I'll just wait until he falls asleep, and sneak out, although I should probably confront him about getting home so late... and on a school night!'. Maddie chuckled to herself, my, how she sounded like her mother.

Maddie had just decided that Danny must be asleep by now when the air cooled down rather abruptly, naturally, her first thought was 'GHOST!', but she knew she couldn't run out guns blazing without alerting her son to her awkward position, so she decided to wait this one out.

To her surprise, she heard her son get up and walk in the direction of the window. There was a bright flash of light and then... Nothing. That was odd, was he still standing by the window? Why was there was no sound!? Not even the sound of shallow breaths. She would have considered him sneaking out, but she hadn't heard the window open or close, plus, the bars Maddie and Jack had installed a few months ago when they discovered Danny's problem with seeking out discouraged that particular action. She had just decided to take a peak (it took her twenty minutes to work up this bit of courage) when there was a thump, like someone landing roughly right on the spot she last heard Danny shuffle to. She tensed, sure it must be some vile specter, infiltrating her sons room, perhaps Danny Phantom again. Of course! That would explain the silence! What if a ghost had pulled Danny intangibly out the window! Maddie got ready to attack when she heard another sound. It was undoubtedly her son.

"God, she's right, she's right, I can't do this anymore," Maddie's ears perked. Perhaps this trip hadn't been a misguided effort after all, perhaps today was the day she would finally find out what was wrong with her baby boy? There was another flash of light, and the room returned to it's previous warmth.

"She's right," he whispered. The anguish was clear on Danny's voice, and Maddie had to fight the urge to go and comfort him, she wondered who this 'she' could be, and what had she told her son that resulted in the awful hopeless tinge in his voice? Her question was quickly answered.

"Spectra's right. I'm nothing. Nothing but an unrealistic optimistic freak. I keep thinking I can do the right thing, that I'm helping people, that they care. But nobody really cares about a freak like me at all," the tears were unmistakable in his voice. She could imagine the hopeless expression on Danny's face as he brokenly whispered the words. Maddie clenched her fists. What piece of pure garbage had told her son such lies! She was outraged, she wished she could find this 'Spectra' and wring her neck for making her son believe such (excuse her French) bullshit. Perhaps this was what was wrong? Maybe 'Spectra' was a girl that her son liked? One that had been putting him down? But that didn't make sense. Her son loved Sam, that was obvious, plus, he had started to pull away at least a year ago, how was it possible she never met this girl if she had such an impact on his life?

Maybe you were to busy with your work, with your inventions, to notice Maddie shook her head. That voice had been bothering her more and more lately, never missing a chance to point out her failings as a parent. She hated to admit it, but she was pretty sure that that voice was her conscience.

Back to this 'Spectra', maybe she wasn't a girl her son liked, perhaps just someone he looked up to, or just someone he knew really. Perhaps she wasn't part of this at all, just someone who had unlocked feelings he had always had. This seemed more likely as Danny's rant continued. She could hear him restlessly pacing the room, she could hear the tears in the cracks in his voice. How had her sweet innocent baby boy become so broken?

"I'm useless. So useless. At school I'm nothing, nothing but a loser and a freak. Someone for other kids to push around and to tease, someone to beat up and push into lockers, less than dirt, a nobody. They even like to watch the 'football star' as he beats me up, sometimes they ignore it, sometimes they like to cheer us on, as if it were a real fight, and not me about to be beat up for being a freak, they don't know what I can do, how I can hurt them, they don't know what will happen if they ever push me beyond my limits, but they're very close to finding out, I can feel it. I don't want that to happen, I can't let that happen," he was whispering the words in agony, and Maddie felt tears start to gather in her eyes. She remembered the countless times Danny, her baby, had walked through the door limping, or with black eyes and bruises.

'I'm fine' he would say, 'I tripped, I'm such a klutz' he would laugh. Only now did she realize how strained those laughs had sounded. How had she not seen that her son was the victim of, apparently, very intense bullying? It seemed so obvious now, she felt like a horrible mother, not being able to see her own child was suffering.

"Then there's the teachers. God, to them I'm even more of a loser. An idiot who never does his work, no special talents to make up for being stupid, not like Dash or the other sporty 'golden boys'. I'm just another loser doomed to a future of working at the Nasty Burger. They assume I'm lazy, that's why I'm late and don't do my work. They never stop to think that, just maybe, something else is going on in my life. Something they couldn't even begin to understand!... No, scratch that, they know something is happening, at least, they know how everyone else treats me, everyone of them has seen me stumble out of a locker or struggle to stand up off the ground at least once, they just don't give a crap, because I'm nothing to them but a worthless piece of shit to get rid of as fast as they can!" He was crying and shouting now. At the last syllable, the sound of plaster being crunched was heard. Danny had literally punched through a wall.

Maddie could feel her heart breaking, and anger clouding her vision. How dare these people treat her son like this! They are teachers! They are supposed to know when something is wrong in a students life, they are supposed to help! Then all that anger turned to self-loathing and sorrow at her precious Danny's next words.

"and my parents aren't any better," his tone had shifted from anger to sadness, like this was the point that hurt him more than the rest. "To them I'm nothing but a failure as well. I'm not the perfect brilliant child genius that Jazz is," Maddie felt horrible as she listened to the pain she had managed to inflict in her son. All that time of thinking he didn't care when she tried to talk to him about what he was doing, only to find out he held and bottled up each word so that he could cut himself with them later.

"They don't even care about me enough to notice, or even try to figure out, the truth anymore! They're to wrapped up in their own little world of inventing and ghosts to see my cuts and bruises. You would think even the most unobservant parents would at least notice the more than occasional broken bone!" Maddie gasped, broken bones?! Had Danny come home with broken bones? No, it wasn't possible, it would be impossible to miss that, if not the day he came, then at least the months after that it would take any bone to heal (little did she know his bones took substantially less time). Yet... why would he lie to himself? He thought he was alone in his room, he would have no reason to say he came home with broken bones unless he really did. Maddie considered the possibility and felt sick. What must he think of his parents if they can't even tell when something so obvious is wrong with him? This question was quickly, and painfully, answered.

"I have to come to terms with the fact that, even though I have always wanted to see them as quirky and determined, they're really just negligent," tears started streaming down Maddie's cheeks. He was right, how could she not see the pain in her own child, when was the last time she really tried to talk with Danny? These were obviously things and feelings that had been growing for a very long time, what kind of abusive parent couldn't see them forming?

"...or maybe that's not it. It's not that hard to see the truth, all they have to do is really look at me, they see both sides of me everyday, sometimes within seconds of each other! It's not like I look very different! Heck, at this point, I might just tell them if they even bothered to ask! But they don't ask, not anymore. Maybe the problem is they don't want to be bothered with some worthless freak like me. Maybe that's why they don't pay attention to me. It's my own fault for being a useless loser. Maybe if I wasn't what I was, I could do more work, study more, be more than a failure in their eyes," Maddie hadn't thought she could feel worse, but hearing her baby blaming her own awful mistakes on himself? That was nearly more than she could take. It broke her heart to hear that all she had to do to know what was wrong was ask. When was the last time she simply acknowledged her son directly? Just tried talking to him? It had been months, she had tried a few times in the beginning, and then just given up. What kind of scientist was she to give up so easily on such an important project as her own child? Her sons next words made her feel horrible for that way of thinking as well.

"Then, if I try to tell them why, try to explain my failing grades, the things happening in my life, if I tell them, they will see me as nothing but the freak of nature that I am, an anomaly that should not exist, something to be studied, and destroyed... A creature that doesn't deserve to exist. I can just see the glee as they strap me down to an examination table and start ripping me apart 'molecule by molecule'. If I tell them I'll have nowhere to hide, they'll probably laugh every time I scream, because no matter who I am, hero, loser, or freak, the fact remains that all anyone loves about me is to see me in pain," Maddie's first reaction is to deny that her and Jack would ever see their precious baby as a science experiment, but then her thoughts from seconds before popped into her head, 'what kind of scientist was she to give up so easily on such an important project, her own child?'. The irony that she had referred to her son as 'an important project' not moments before. She could see how he would think she would see him as an experiment, when was the last time she regarded him as something other than an enigma to be solved and fixed? It had been a while. Sometimes she did see her son as another one of her projects, one that she had put on hold for an unacceptable amount of time. That brought her back to the issue of this 'secret' of his. She had thought it was bullying, but now he seemed to be talking about something else entirely. What happened next made her blood turn cold.

"Maybe I should take away everyone's pleasure in watching me suffer..." Maddie felt the morbid undercurrent to that statement send a shiver down her spine. "Oh, who am I kidding, I would be doing it for them, so that they will always be safe from him, so that they can finally move on and not have to worry about the loser, useless, stupid, idiot, freak. So that I can stop being a disappointment, people never talk bad about the dead," he let out a humorless laugh, "well, that's just a lie. I know first hand that isn't true. I guess I'll rephrase that, people don't talk bad about the dead as long as they don't come back to bother them later... I'll have to make sure that doesn't happen," he sounded strangely cold and resigned, and Maddie was having a harder time than usual trying to ignore what he was saying, because her baby boy couldn't possible be considering... that.

Maddie heard him plop himself onto his desk chair, and the sound of paper crinkling as he started to write. No, he can't possibly, he can't possibly be talking about what I think. He... Things can't be that bad, that he would see something so... so drastic as his only option, right? Maddie was horrified at the thought that her son, her beautiful, innocent, baby boy could possibly be up at what must be close to midnight, contemplating... suicide. He just couldn't be! Could she really be such a horrible parent that she didn't notice he was not only physically hurt, but mentally strained to the point of taking his own life just to escape? Maddie's shoulders began to shake, and she could hardly keep her sobs silent. How long had it been this bad? It couldn't have been long, she would have noticed if her son had been this bad for long, right? Then insult was added to injury as she heard her son stand up and gently fold whatever it was he has been writing.

"God, I've had the same mental conversation with myself every night for the past five months, I've been to much of a selfish coward to just do it already,"

There went any illusions on being even a mediocre parent out the window. Five months, the words swirled in her head. Her son had been violently depressed for five months, during which at any time he was moments from taking his own life, and she never noticed?! She should be put away for child neglect. Then her blood ran cold at Danny's next words, it ran cold and froze over,

"well, that's not entirely true, it's not my fault the first time didn't work, how was I supposed to know my freaky mutated metabolism is practically immune to most human drugs? Not that it wasn't extremely painful. I still can't believe I was able to pass it off as nothing but a violent stomach virus, just proves my point about the people around me, I suppose," He let out another humorless laugh, and Maddie thought she was going to puke.

She actually remembered that. Her son had looked so pale and frail that morning, when she went to wake him up for school. As soon as she shook his shoulder he had thrown up onto the floor. She remembered his surprise as he looked up at her, and now she knew why. It wasn't surprise on waking up sick, it was surprise at waking up at all. She realized in that moment how close she had come to finding her baby dead that morning.

Her son, her precious baby, had attempted suicide, and she, negligent parent that she was, had thought it was the flu! She remembered feeding him flu medications... God! With all the others in his system (for that was obviously how he had tried to... do what he did), any one of those pills could have been the one that killed him! Maddie Fenton had never felt more horrible in her entire life. How was a mother supposed to deal with the fact that she had driven her own son to such lengths? But Danny wasn't done yet, not even close, and each word felt to her like a fresh stab in the heart.

"Of corse, the pain of that first attempt scared me off for a month, so, like the wimp I am, I tried something less painful. Jumping off the OPs center was a stupid idea to. I should have known I wouldn't be able to let myself hit the ground. I'm such a wuss, I must have tried it three times, only to swoop back up each time, all I really managed to do was almost reveal my secret!" Maddie had the sudden image of Danny's small frail body crushed at unnatural angles on the sidewalk in front of her home. How close had she come to going out to buy groceries only to be treated to the sight of her son's lifeless body when she walked out the door?

He hadn't just attempted suicide once, he had a collection of trials. Maddie felt physically ill, but then the other part of his statement echoed in her mind. He said he had jumped, he had really jumped, and was seconds from hitting the ground, when he 'swooped' back up. What did that even mean? That entails that he had the power to stop himself from falling, the power to defy gravity. Only a select few had that kind of power, and they weren't alive. But... But that was impossible! Danny was very plainly alive, as his recent attempts at taking that from himself prove. Obviously there was something here she was missing, or rather, Maddie couldn't shake the feeling that she was missing something obvious. Something that would connect all her son's odd quirks, habits, and tendencies... Something really important...

She had no time to think about it as the last things she ever wanted to hear assaulted her ears. She heard her son searching around in his drawers pulling something metallic out, then he settled down, (it sounded like sitting criss-cross) on his bed, and laid the paper he had been writing next to him.

"This time will be different, fool-proof. I'm sorry Jazz, I know you tried your best, I hope you don't blame yourself. It wasn't your fault, you were the best sister I could have asked for. I put it in the letter, could you please tell Mom and Dad the truth? I hate to push it all on you, but they need to know, I don't want them to mourn me, so please tell them of the misguided monster I was, but tell them that I didn't mean it, that I really tried to do the right thing, that I never meant for anyone to get hurt... I tried to be good. Please, Jazz, I love you, try to make them understand, even if they won't ever believe you, just try. I will miss you big sister." A deep breath and a sob hung in the air. Maddie was petrified to the point that she couldn't even move, no, this can't be happening, her mind refused to compute the evidence in front of her. She was petrified she knew she needed to move, but her body would not obey, was this what shock was like? Danny started again,

"Tucker, you were my rock, my best friend since forever, I can't remember a time without you, you were always there to ease the tension, but you can't help, not this time. I'm so sorry for leaving you, take care of Sam... Sam. Sam, I loved you," He laughed, "there, that's the first time I've ever said it out loud. I wish I could tell you, but I can't drag you down like that, you deserve better that the freak of nature I've become. You understood me better than anyone, sometimes better than I understood myself, and I'm sorry if this hurts you, but you'll be free of me now. I've explained everything in this letter for you guys, and Mom and Dad and Jazz. I'm sorry, but I'm done. I hope you understand, it's not just the pain and the pressure, I can feel myself beginning to snap. If everyone keeps pushing me, I'm going to turn into him and I promised you all that would never happen, so I'm sorry, but Danny Fenton and Danny Phantom both need to die, no one needs then anymore anyway."

Danny Phantom? Okay, maybe she was a horrible mother for focusing on that word in her son's terrifying sentence, Maddie didn't much know. The words were to terrifying for any mother to imagine, and so she concentrated instead on the familiar. Why in the world would her son add on Danny Phantom? Why would Danny Fenton, who was always disappearing, majorly stressed, covered in wounds, always tired, broken, was able to 'swoop back up' after jumping off buildings, was somehow immune to overdosing on medical drugs, and had a room full of ghost hunting equipment and ectoplasmic injections, ever mention killing Danny Phantom, who had the power of invisibility, was always needed at two places at once, was the personal punching bag of most ghosts who visited the human realm, was always racing around and fighting, had the ability to fly, was made of ectoplasm (a degenerative substance), and was a ghost? A moment of silence, and then suddenly everything fit into place.

"No," the whisper was nearly nonexistent as it left Maddie's lips. She matched and rematched everything she just thought, and cross-referenced it with everything her son had said to this point. It was so obvious! It was that giant piece that brings everything else together that she had never been able to see. Her son... her son was the ghost boy!

Up to this point, Maddie had been frozen in shock and fear, but the sound of a safety latch being switched threw her out if her stupor, followed by the unmistakable warning beep she installed in the defunct ghost gun from hours earlier. Her fifteen year old son was docking the new ghost gun, oh God, her suicidal fifteen year old half ghost son was holding the only one of their ghost weapons that could harm both humans and ghosts... or, theoretically, anything in-between.

"Danny!" Maddie sobbed as she jumped and stumbled out of the closet. If she was smarter, or in right mind, she wouldn't have startled him like that, the last thing she needed was for him to pull the trigger out of surprise... or desperation, but she wasn't thinking straight. So she ran straight to her son and threw her arms around his trembling figure, quickly tugging the weapon out of his terrified grasp. She added leaves dangerous weapons unattended in home when I knew my son was acting a bit strange lately to her long lists of ignorant mistakes she's made as a mother. Maddie wrapped her arms around her baby and finally let her sobs break loose, she expected her child to do the same. Surly he could see his mistake? Then she realized that he had tried this before, and he still decided to do it again, he obviously didn't believe there was anything worth living for anymore. No matter how much she wanted to, she couldn't change that with a simple hug.

"M-mom, w-what are you doing here?" His dulled (how hadn't she noticed their grave lack of the brightness that had once been there?) blue eyes wide with horror. "How much did you- I mean, how much do you–"

"Everything, Daniel James Fenton, or, maybe you'd rather be called Danny Phantom?" She smiled weakly, but the attempt at a joke deflated humorlessly in the dark room. It probably wasn't that far from the truth. He was free as Phantom, with none of the pain that plagued Fenton. Why would he want to be the scrawny kid with weird parents that do nothing but cause him pain? "Of course you'd rather be called Phantom, you're more him than you are Danny," she was really just talking to herself, going over the mind boggling information she had just learned, however, never again would she be so caught up in the quest for answers that she would neglect her children, and she knew why what happened next happened. If it were possible, Danny's eyes became even larger, the tears doubling in volume. Suddenly he jerked out of her arms and struggled out of her embrace, lunging for the weapon sitting next to them on the bed.

"Danny, No!" thank God she saw the widening of his eyes, and realized what she had said wrong, thank God she knew what he was about to do right before he did it. If she didn't she wouldn't have stood a chance. If he had the element of surprise, he would have made it easily, but she did see, and the adrenaline of a desperate mother made her much stronger than she should have been as she snapped her hand around his wrists and jerked him back. Just because she knew what he was going to do, though, didn't make it easy. For the first time in her life, Maddie Fenton was aware of, and subject to, the inhuman strength of her youngest child as he desperately clawed for the gun, fingers barely grazing the handle before she tugged him back. His leg flailed out from under him and he landed a sloppy kick to her shoulder, gaining another inch that allowed him to take hold of the weapon, but still Maddie didn't let go.

Ignoring the pain in her shoulder, Maddie thanked the powers that be for whatever was keeping him from using full strength. Maddie had literally seen Phantom send monsters the size of buildings through walls with a single kick, if he wanted to he could decapitate her anytime he wished without breaking a sweat, so she was thankful that perhaps his ghost body held all of his supernatural strength and powers, or maybe he was just so desperate he couldn't concentrate on summoning that strength, or he simply didn't want to hurt her even in his desperation (little did she know the real explanation was pretty simple, the leg he had kicked her with was broken, and the arm she had tugged back shared the same fate. Tugging on them had greatly depleted his strength).

Maddie was thankful, as suddenly only the wispy form of her son's hand on hers was visible, that she had decided today was a good day to try out her new ghost intangibility proof HAZMAT suit and not the new and improved portable ghost shield as she had originally planned, for all these things she was thankful as, by some miracle, she managed to pull the super powered boy to her chest and twist the gun he was now holding to his chest away from where it pointed and in the opposite direction just as he pulled the trigger and it discharged into the ceiling. Maddie stared at the smoking hole in shock. That could have been Danny was the only thing her stunned mind could seem to process. She looked down at the trembling tear-stained boy in her arms, she could imagine the burnt hole on his body, the paleness of his skin, the lifelessness of his eyes... Maddie quickly shook her head to clear it from thought. She couldn't concentrate on the horror of what could have happened, she was needed in the now.

"Danny!" She shouted at her still struggling son. "Danny! I didn't mean it like that! I don't see you as nothing but a ghost! I would never experiment on you, my own son, just for being different. I know that you're still the same person you've always been, being Phantom is a part of who you are!" Maddie urgently tried to communicate with him the true meaning of her thoughtless words. Danny's struggling let out a bit as he tried to gain control of his voice.

"Then," sob, "then why did, why did you say I was more" sob, "more Phantom than I was Danny!?" He shouted, "that I was more ghost than I was your son," he whispered.

"Phantom is my son just as much as 'Danny' is, and I love him more than anything in the world," she whispered, slowly loosening her grip as his struggling slowed.

Danny was trembling so hard they might have been shivers, the gun slowly slid out of his grasp and fell with a muffled thunk onto the tangled bed covers as the tension in his muscles melted away and sobs started emanating from deep within him. Unconsciously his hands fisted around the familiar comforting blue material of his mother's jumpsuit, and he turned the top half of his body and buried his head into the nook between her head and shoulder, sobbing uncontrollably.

"Shh, shh, baby, it's okay, everything is going to be okay," she whispered into his ear, rubbing his back reassuringly as he wept into her shoulder. When he had calmed down a bit, she pulled away and stared at Danny's puffy tear stained face. She looked deep into his sky blue eyes.

"Danny, you are my world. You have a heart of gold and are smart and handsome. I love you more than my own life, and I firmly believe you can reach every one of your dreams. I don't deserve a son as wonderful as you. A hero. Someone so kind and selfless it makes my search for glory look dirty. You have always followed your heart, and your conscience, you have saved the lives of hundreds of people, no matter how much they despise you. You, Danny Fenton-Phantom, are destined to do great things, you have already done great things. I love you, Danny, you are my hero, please forgive me?"

Maddie watched fresh tears stream down Danny's face. A sob escaped his lips as he pulled his mother into a crushing embrace, the gun falling off the bed and clacking onto the floor, cracking down the middle. Muffled sobs shook his sickly thin body. Had he been starving himself? When had he last ate? How had she not noticed she hasn't seen him eat in months? He couldn't have been going that long without food though, right? He was half ghost, how long could he physically go without food? She had so many many questions with no answers, but every single one of those questions could wait. Science could wait indefinitely as long as her baby was still in her arms. Never again would her quest for the truths of the universe get in the way of the truths that really mattered.

"I'm- I'm sorry, mom, I love you too, I- thank you," Danny laughed, tears streaming down his face, "thank you," he whispered again, burrowing deeper into her side. Maddie ran her hand through his soft raven locks, bracing his head tightly against her chest and curling protectively around him while he cried and clutched onto her like the literal life line she had become.

"Shh, my baby, Mommy's here for you. Everything's going to be alright. Mommy will never leave you all alone again, my beautiful baby boy, I love you."


	2. Reality

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What you have read is the original and happy ending. DO NOT CONTINUE unless you want to be sad today and, if you could be triggered, have read the warnings in the end note.

Maddie woke up with a smile. The whole day seemed brighter, the light brighter, the morning clearer. Last night had been the worst of her life. Not only had she discovered her son had been lying to her for years, but also that he was violently depressed and was planing on taking his own life. However, as Maddie woke up the next morning she felt great. She jumped out if bed and slipped on her favorite blue jumpsuit. She kissed Jack's forehead where he was snoring next to her on the bed and skipped out of the room to the kitchen.

As Maddie worked around in the kitchen she thought about Danny, Maddie wasn't ignorant, not anymore at least, and she knew this was far from over. Danny had been like this for months from what she learned, and that wasn't going to change overnight, but it was a start. Maddie smiled as she flipped two pancakes onto a plate and grabbed the chocolate fudge syrup, Danny's favorite breakfast, and she hadn't made it in ages. It was part if her plan, she was going to make sure Danny, her baby, knew he was loved and cared for, that he belonged here, with family and friends, whether he was ghost, boy, or something in-between. They would get Danny the help he needed, and he wouldn't ever feel alone again. This was the first step.

Maddie loaded the plate and a glass of milk onto a tray and glided out of the kitchen and up the tiled steps of Fentonworks. She giggled as she slowly and stealthily crept up to the door of her son's room,

"Danny! Wake up!" She laughed as she swung open the door. "I made you pancak–" the tray fell to the floor with a clatter, plate shattering and milk seeping through the carpet. Maddie backed up in shock, and fell back against the wall, hands covering her mouth and eyes watering.

"No..." Her voice had no sound as she searched for breath that just wasn't there, "no." She fell to the ground with a scream of pain and terror, "no," she buried her head in her lap.

Three feet in front of her hung the body of her fifteen-year-old son, blue eyes open in pain and silent accusation, a steady drip of blood creeping out of the corner of his nose onto the cold floor.

Plop, plop, plop

"No."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: Off-screen suicide, explicit post-suicide scene, not-happy ending
> 
> National Suicide Prevention Hotline: 1-800-273-8255  
> If you don't like talking on the phone, you can also chat online. Just google them. 
> 
> Some Resources if you live in Europe: http://www.iasp.info/resources/Crisis_Centres/Europe/
> 
> Some Canadian Hotlines: http://www.suicide.org/hotlines/international/canada-suicide-hotlines.html

**Author's Note:**

> National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (1-800-273-TALK [8255])


End file.
